Damon Knight - Orbit 19

He was plotting. He was having a steak and beer party in the back yard, inviting all his bowling buddies and a few extra men who were going to help him cut down the old rotten tree, net the possums -- possums? -- and then feast.

“Someone will get killed,” I pointed out. “The tree is over eighty feet tall.” He smiled his smuggest smile and I threw my cup at him. He ducked and dialed another number.

The next day I bought clothesline and pulleys and made them an escape route to a maple tree at the property line. I fastened a small Easter basket to the rope and if they were as clever as I thought, they would figure out the pulley arrangement. If not, they could get out hand over hand. I explained to them what they had to do, and then, to be certain they understood, I wrote it down for them and left the message in the basket. I was still worried that they wouldn’t know how to use the basket, and at three in the morning, I took out the awful beads Howard had brought home and put them in the basket and for half an hour worked it back and forth. They were watching. They watch everything; that is their strength.

Howard brought home the steaks. (Two dollars ninety-eight cents a pound, twelve of them, all more than 2 pounds. I could have cried.) There was a case of beer in a cooler on the patio. I fed steaks to the dog, but even the monster couldn’t eat more than three of them. Howard bought replacements and stood by the refrigerator every time I moved.

He carried the chain saw about with him, afraid I would hex it.

“Get lost!” Howard said Saturday morning. “We’re going to cut that damn tree down, catch those things and cage them and then eat steak and drink beer and play poker. Bug off!”

“We’re being childish,” I said. “I was bored and played a game, pretended I saw something, and you convinced yourself that you saw it too. That’s what children do. I’ll go look for a job Monday. No more games.”

He made a noncommittal noise.

“Or maybe I’m pregnant. Sometimes pregnant women imagine strange things, instead of craving strange foods.”

He glared at me.

The men began to gather and there was a lot of consultation about the tree, with several of them walking around it thoughtfully, spilling beer as they gestured. As if they knew something about cutting down trees. They would get drunk and he would cut someone’s head off, I thought.

I watched him start the saw and winced at the noise. I didn’t know if they had escaped or not; there was no way to tell. Someone pointed upward and Howard stopped the saw and again they all considered the task. It had been pointed out that in movies they always cut off branches and the top first. Otherwise the tree would surely demolish the house when it fell.

Someone got the ladder and Howard climbed it and started the saw again. He brought it down to the tree limb, hesitated, turned off the saw, dropped it to the ground and climbed back down.

He was trembling. “I just wanted to give the old lady a scare. Show her who’s boss. Let’s eat.” He didn’t look at me.

He got drunk and after the others had gone he told me the saw had come alive, turned on him. He had seen his leg being cut off, had seen it falling and had thought it was beautiful that way. The saw was turning in his hands when he switched it off and dropped it.

I should have had more faith in their ability to protect themselves.

I don’t believe it was his leg.

Howard has forgotten about them, pretends he never believed in them in the first place. He never glances at the tree, and he burned all the pictures he took, even the infrared ones.

I have too much to do to work outside the house any more. He accepts that. I am charting all their likes and dislikes. When I left them chopped turnip, there was a grease fire that could have burned down the house. I crossed off turnips. When I find out-of-season fruits, like mangoes, cut up just so with a touch of lemon juice, something nice happens, like the telegram from my mother on my birthday. They like for me to wear soft, flowing, white gowns. My blue jeans brought a thunderstorm, and lightning hit the pole out front and we were without electricity for twenty-four hours.

There is a ritual I go through now when Howard wants to go to bed with me. He doesn’t object. It excites him, actually, to see me undress under the tree.

They liked the mouse I caught for them, and I’m wondering if they would like a chick, or a game hen. The mouse got Howard a Christmas bonus. I know a place that sells live chicks ....

. . . If it were not so, I would have told you.

Old Woman: So you are the new woman from the Motherworld. Well, come in and sit down. I saw you coming up the road on your machine.

Oh yes, Todd and I, we’ve always been friendly with you people, though there are some here still that remember the War. This was a rich district, you know, before; for a few, that’s hard to forget.

Well, it’s all behind us now, and it wasn’t us anyway. Just my father and Todd’s—and your grandmother, I suppose. Even if you were carried in a bottle, you must have had a grandmother, and she would have fought against us. Still, it’s good of you now to send people to help us rebuild here, though as you can see it hasn’t done much good.

I didn’t mean this place was here before the War—not much that you’ll see was. Todd built this thirty years ago; he was younger then—couldn’t do it now. You know, you are such a pretty thing—can’t I get you a cup? Well, we call it tea, but your people don’t. The woman who was here before you, she always said how much better the real tea was, but she never gave us any.

I tasted it once, but I didn’t like it. I was brought up on our own brewing, you see. I’ll pour you a glass of our wine if you won’t take tea; this cake has got a trifle dry.

Oh, I can imagine well enough what it’s been like. Going around from one to another saying, “Have you seen her? Do you know what happened to her?” and getting hostile looks and not much else. It’s because of the War, you know. That’s what my mother always said. People here weren’t like that before the War. Now—well, they know that you’re supposed to help them, to make up for it; and you’re not doing it now, are you? Just going about looking for your friend.

I doubt you’ll ever see her again. She’s been taken. I don’t suppose you know about that—the old houses? She didn’t either when she came; we had to tell her about it. I would have thought they’d teach you—put it in a little book to give out or something. Did you get one of those? Never mind—I’ve seen them. Saw hers, for all of that. She was such a pretty thing, just like you.

I don’t mind telling you—it’s the old houses, the ones built before the War. Todd’s family had one down at Breaker, and my own family, we had one here. I hear yours are different—all shiny metal and shaped like eggs, or else like nails stood on end. Ours weren’t like that; not in the old days, and no more now. More like this one you’re sitting in: wood, or what looked like it. But for all that you beat us, our fathers and grandfathers—and our mothers and grandmothers too, for our women weren’t what you think, you don’t really know about it—they had more power over machines than you do. They didn’t use them to make more machines, though; just put them in their houses to help out. They were friendly to their homes, you see, and thought their homes should be friendly to them.

Some say the brains of people were used to make the houses think. Taken out of the heads and put in jars in secret rooms, with wires running all over to work little fusion motors. Others say that the heads are still there, and the bodies too, to take care of the brains; but the houses don’t know it anymore, or don’t care. They say that if you were to go inside, and open the door of the right room, you’d see someone still lying on a bed that was turning to dust, while the eyes watched you from every picture.